NEWBY (Gordon Darnell), A History of the Jews of Arabia, From Ancient Times to Their Eclipse under Islam, Columbia, University of South Carolina press, (Studies in comparative religion / University of South Carolina), 1988, x+177 p. ISBN 0-87249-558-2

L’auteur

Né à Salt Lake City en 1939, Gordon Darnell Newby est le doyen du Département des études sur l’Asie du Sud et du Moyen-Orient à l’Université Emory. Il est egalement Professeur dans le cadre du programme d’études supérieures sur les d’Asie du Sud et de l’Ouest. Il est l’auteur de The Making of the Last Prophet et de A Concise Encyclopedia of Islam

Presentation

The Jewish communities of Arabia had a great influence on the attitudes that Muslims hold toward Jews, and yet relatively little has been written about their history. Through techniques borrowed from anthropology, literary criticism, sociology, and comparative religion, Gordon Darnell Newby reconstructs the understanding of Jewish life in Arabia before and during the time of Muhammad. In addition this material is used to develop a perspective on the interconfessional relations between Judaism and Islam during an era when the latter was at one of its most dynamic stages of growth.

Table des matieres

Preface
Introduction

1. Looking at the Past
2.Legends and Ancient Origins
3. Jews, Arabs, and Romans
4. The Southern Jewish Kingdoms
5. The Jews of the Hijaz
6. Muhammad and the Jews
7. Arabian Judaism after Muhammad
8. Afterword on Historiography

Abbreviations in Notes and Bibliography
Notes, Bibliography, Index

Extrait

This volume is an extended essay about reconstructing the Arabian Jewish past. I have meant for it to be a synthesis of what we know about Arabian Jewry, but I have not tried to close the discussion about either the methodology or the content. (p. 5)

Book review online in BCAI (french)

– www.ifao.egnet.net/bcai/9/92/

Note: Merci au Professeur émérite Claude Gilliot pour l’indication de la date et du lieu de naissance de l’auteur (MA)